


A Tavern Talk

by resonant_aura



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: F/M, M/M, Multi, OT3, establishing shot of a relationship, in which Keyleth is brave and uses her words
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-01
Updated: 2016-05-01
Packaged: 2018-06-05 14:46:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,532
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6709204
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/resonant_aura/pseuds/resonant_aura
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which Gilmore is sad and lonely, Keyleth is bold and on a contact high from cider, Vax'ildan is asleep and unhelpful, and everyone is a hero. In other words, one way the three of them worked out how to be together.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Tavern Talk

**Author's Note:**

  * For [RiverWye](https://archiveofourown.org/users/RiverWye/gifts).



> Disclaimer: All the people and places you recognize are the intellectual property of their respective creators--Marisha Ray, Matt Mercer, Liam O'Brien, and the other amazing cast members of Geek & Sundry’s fantastic webstream show Critical Role. 
> 
> I wrote this in a half-asleep fever fit about five weeks ago, shortly after I posted "Of the Day, Of the Night." It was 3 AM, I was typing with my eyes closed, and it was all because I couldn't stop thinking of RiverWye's comment: someone needs to introduce these three to polyamory. So this is one of the ways where they are introduced to polyamory. This takes place in an imaginary future when the dragons are defeated and everyone is taking a well-deserved rest... and there is tavern drinking because somehow Keyleth always ends up there. And of course I wrote this before the Raven Queen fiasco happened, so none of that angst here. RiverWye, this one's for you!

It’s unexpected, one night, a night in a tavern. The aftermath is coming through to completion, the memories of fire and poison and death are still sharp and bright but a little fuzzy at the edges, dulled even more with copious amounts of mulled cider. The lights are accordingly dim for such heavy drinking, and Vax is accordingly quite drunk.

At some point in the evening he’d wandered over to Keyleth and collapsed on the deep, fluffy cushions set on the floor where she was lounging. (Most of the wooden furniture was stockpiled and has yet to be returned to the original owners.) He’s still there, eyes flickering behind their lids in restless sleep, his head lolled onto Keyleth’s shoulder at just such an angle that it’s more breast than bone upon which he has settled.

Keyleth finds that she doesn’t mind. More, she’s quite comfortable.

But.

Throughout the evening there was a feeling—the feeling of eyes, dark and sad and heavy with unvoiced thoughts, settling over her back like a mantle. She knows exactly where it’s coming from. Only now, as those eyes are fixed on the door and making their way out into the early morning, does she have the opportunity to lighten the load.

“Gilmore,” she calls softly. “Shaun. Wait.”

Gilmore hesitates at the threshold. The look he throws over his shoulder is annoyed and weary. “Keyleth. My apologies but I am quite tired.”

“I know. Just—come rest. Here. Stay.” She swallows, a convulsive gesture. “With us. Please.”

There’s a long pause, but finally the wizard heaves a deep sigh and joins her on the pile of cushions. He sits and seems to be waiting for something, that sad, weary gaze locked onto hers.

“Um.” She frowns a little. “I don’t really know what I’m doing.”

Still he waits. She swallows again.

“Look,” she says finally on a burst of breath, “I just know that—Vax misses you. He hates what he did to you. He hates what it did to him.”

Very, very slowly, Gilmore leans his weight on one arm which sinks into the soft pillow beneath him. He blinks. “And what is that?” he asks in his deep velvet voice.

She realizes that she’s swallowing because her mouth is dry. She takes a swig—probably too deep, oh well, too late—of her cider. “Well, he broke your heart, obviously.”

A bitter quirk of a smile tugs at his lips. “I’ve survived worse.”

“Yeah. I know. Dragons.” She waves one hand negligently, forgetting that her mug is still in that hand—the brew sloshes a little onto the floor and the cushions. She curses, then blushes. “Okay, never mind all that. The point is: I want to fix it.”

“You want… what?”

Keyleth sets her gaze firmly on Gilmore’s mildly surprised expression. “I’m gonna fix it. Because I’m the one who broke it. Er. I’m the reason it—I don’t know.”

For a moment, Gilmore is stunned into silence. Then he chuckles, a sound almost too deep to be heard, until it grows and unravels from his mouth. A little dazed, Keyleth has the brief and somewhat confusing thought that she can kind of see why Vax is so heartbroken over this man. “Fix it,” he repeats, hiding the stubborn remnants of a smile behind his hand. The stack of spangled bracelets around his wrist shiver and swing in the low light, drawing Keyleth’s eye. “How do you mean to fix it? Hearts are not something that can be tended and restored overnight, or even over seasons, no matter how mighty your connection to nature.”

Her blush deepens. On her chest, Vax shifts restlessly, and she absently reaches up to stroke his hair. Gilmore’s eyes follow her hand, fall to Vax’s face, and then seem to look far away into a bleak landscape, turning cold and distant. “Heartbreak is not something deadly,” he says softly. “Everyone has the ability to recover from it. Eventually.”

“But what if you don’t have to?”

“You still haven’t answered my question. How exactly do you mean to fix our… delicate situation?”

Stubbornly, Keyleth drinks from her mug again. (It's only mulled cider, there's barely a dream of alcohol in it, but that doesn't matter, it doesn't matter when they're all supposed to be happy and if she wants to feel drunk then by heaven she will.) “It’s—well. Stop walking away.”

“Hmm. From what.”

“From him.”

“I believe it was—a mutually understood parting of the ways.”

“You mean he left you.” Keyleth stares into the dark contents of her cup. “But that doesn’t mean you have to agree to walk away. Sometimes you have to ignore what he thinks. Just… stay.”

Gilmore pointedly glances at where Vax is nuzzled into Keyleth’s breast. “That might be a little uncomfortable for some.”

“Who’s some? Not me.”

Her sudden bold attempt at candor has both of them a little slack-jawed. Gilmore’s brows shoot up to his hairline. “I… beg your pardon?”

Keyleth tries not to let the—confusion? panic? where did that thought even come from?—show on her face. The more she thinks about it, the more it seems… true. She sets her jaw. “I mean. I wouldn’t be… troubled. By it. If you were, um. There.”

Gilmore, she suddenly remembers, is a businessman. He is intimately (don’t think of that word right now, why is that a word right now?!) familiar with contracts and agreements; he’s an expert at keeping his expression clear and neutral. Which he is doing. Right now.

Keyleth tries very, very, _very_ hard not to squirm. She fails.

“You mean… a shared partner?” Gilmore asks in a very delicate tone.

“Well, that’s, that’s one thing.” She drinks again. The second part she murmurs in a rush into the depths of the mug. “And there’s other things too probably like maybe everyone together I don't know.”

When she lowers the (now sadly empty) mug down to the floor, there’s no change in his expression. No, wait—a subtle one. A subtle but undeniably curious, wicked gleam to Gilmore’s dark eyes, appreciative laugh lines just creasing the corners. “Other things,” he says blandly.

Keyleth shrugs, then hurriedly reaches for Vax to rescue him from being dislodged. She fusses with his weight, face averted from the suddenly intense scrutiny she is now subjected to.

“Forgive me my maladroitness, but given that we are discussing intimate matters already, allow me to ask—what is it that catches your attention, Keyleth?”

“My attention?”

Gilmore’s face is carefully still, vaguely lined with compassion. “What arouses you, my dear.”

“Oh. Oh, well—oh. Oh!” Keyleth stumbles her way to comprehension and feels a hot blush crawl up her neck again. Maybe she's never really dealt with Gilmore one on one before; did she only talk with Gilmore’s assistant at the shop? Has he always made her this… responsive? No wait, responsive isn’t—surely there’s another word, what is _happening_ to her tonight—

“Keyleth?”

“I, um, I’m not sure what you mean.”

He smiles, and this time the compassion is obvious in his expression. It’s comforting, even when this bewildering conversation has gone from awkward to surprising to downright weird in a matter of minutes. (But not bad weird, just I-have-no-idea-what-I’m-doing-weird, and that isn’t new anyway, and if Vax were awake—) “I don’t mean specifics, if that makes you uncomfortable,” Gilmore interrupts her runaway thoughts gently. “I’m merely attempting to solve a puzzle. Man, woman, no preferred gender, something in between—what is it that you are most often attracted to? Or perhaps carnal desire isn’t something that interests you? Although…” He trails off, gaze drifting to Vax once again. “To be quite frank, I would find that difficult to believe.”

Well that’s it. Her face is just on fire now. No coming back from that. “I, uh…” Her voice is a cracking whisper but she pushes through, encouraged by Gilmore’s kindness and her own good intentions. “I guess I—I don’t really know. There hasn’t really been anyone, before Vax—I don’t even know if _Vax_ is—” she sighs heavily. “It’s complicated. I mean there was always my studying, and my journey, my family, and now Vox Machina, it never seems as important as—” She gestures impotently, one hand rising and falling in a helpless motion.

Gilmore nods. “Understandable. A romantic partner is often an unsought event that tumbles into one’s life with no respect for one’s goals or circumstances.”

Keyleth smiles a little. “I guess you would know? So, um, what is it that—who are you attracted to? Besides Vax.” She jostles him a little on her shoulder.

Gilmore eyes her quietly and says, “I’ve always been a man attracted to… an unexpected sort of character. A specific kind of charm.” He smiles almost wistfully, lost in memory. “Vax carries it in spades, and what’s more devastating is he’s convinced he doesn’t truly possess it. His feeling of unworthiness is one of the most endearing and upsetting qualities he has—if only because he inspires me to convince him otherwise.” He focuses on her again, and Keyleth’s breath swoops into her chest and hides there. “You have a great deal of that charm yourself, Keyleth.”

“Thanks. I think. I-I’m not—I’m not Vax, though.”

“Of course you aren’t, and there is no reason why you should try to be. You are enough as you are. More than enough.” He nods to Vax—and that brings them back around again.

She blows her breath out in a steady stream, trying to think. Her head feels like a river, all rushing and swimmy, but maybe that’s helpful. “Okay. So: you’re in love with Vax. I’m—I care about him. A lot. And he says he’s in love with me. And he told you—not to be in love with him. But that’s not fair, when it really doesn’t bother me and it wouldn’t bother you and it definitely wouldn’t bother him. At least, I think it wouldn’t bother you—right? Because I—have charm. You said.” In the dim light of the lanterns, Gilmore’s eyes are dancing and his lips slowly curving into a warm smile as Keyleth works her thoughts out in words. “And, and maybe you’re attracted to me but maybe you aren’t—probably not. And I don’t know if I’m attracted to you because I don’t really know if I’m attracted to anybody and it’s just a little weird for me, you know, with everyone kissing me all the time now and me not knowing how or why and—and Vax must be attracted to you because he kissed you and he’s kissed me too, a lot, so.” She thinks hard for a second, trying to find the bottom of the swimmy river, but it makes her head hurt. She scrunches up her nose. “Where does that leave us?”

“With possibilities.” Gilmore cocks his head a little to one side, considering. “Normally I would suggest that, in the current location and with your talent for imbibing, this would not be the time for any undue affections. However… it does create an ideal atmosphere for experimentation.”

“Are we experimenting?” Keyleth bites her lip for a moment. “I have to admit—it would make Vax happy. If we were… if we were all… each other’s. Somehow. That would fix things. I think.”

“Oh, darling girl.” Gilmore shakes his head ruefully. “Do not press yourself into an embrace for the sake of another’s happiness. There’s only painful endings that way.”

“I’m not!” Keyleth protests hotly, then quiets when Vax stirs. “I’m not. I just—that’s only a part of it. Vax is. I can… understand why he likes you.”

“And I believe I’m beginning to understand the same of you.” 

“I think you might need someone to love you, too.” Keyleth wrings her hands together, a mindless fidget. “And more love is nice, right? If it’s there. If it _could_ be there.”

Gilmore’s smile is very warm. It feels like an invitation. “Keyleth,” he says softly, “would you perhaps be interested in initiating a kiss with someone, rather than receiving one?”

“Huh?”

“Come here.”

She gently deposits Vax on the pillows beside her and scooches across the floor to the opposite set of cushions. Gilmore gently strokes a finger across her cheekbone, leaving a burning line of sensual awareness. Keyleth cups her own cheek, surprised. “Kiss me,” the wizard murmurs, gently tipping his head toward her in encouragement.

She has no idea why—except that, in this moment, it feels utterly expected, and right, and good. Keyleth leans forward and presses her lips to his.

They’re soft; softer than Vax’s, and the tickle of his beard is an unfamiliar sensation that is actually really fun. She rubs her chin back and forth, just a little, for more of it. He smells different than Vax, feels different, moves differently—but it’s all right.

“Holy _shit._ ”

Despite the vulgar interruption, Keyleth and Gilmore draw apart slowly, both assessing the other and smiling in response when they find only mutual enjoyment and curiosity. Then Gilmore’s eyes slide to the side and he snorts. “Vax’ildan,” he greets the half-elf silkily, “back among the living?”

“I don’t think so,” Vax replies. “I think I died. I’m dead. This is a dream.”

“You’re not dead and you’re not dreaming,” Keyleth laughs, and spontaneously lifts an arm to drape around Gilmore’s shoulders. He stiffens under her touch for a brief moment, then relaxes into her side. She feels him hide a smile against the side of her neck. “Go back to sleep, Vax. We’ll go home in a little bit, okay?”

It only feels right, somehow, to walk Gilmore to the door—even if walking (and doors) have become alarmingly difficult tasks.

“You’re sure you’re all right?” he asks, frowning in concern.

“It’s fine! I’ll be fine. We’re fine.” Keyleth grins, her tone bright and cheery. The evening has gone really nicely for a change.

Gilmore smiles again, that funny little quirk of the mouth rather than his usual brilliant grin, and presses a kiss to Keyleth’s forehead. “No more than this, when you’ve been drinking,” he murmurs into her skin. “Although I’m grateful—I suspect you might never have concocted this plan otherwise.”

“Nooo,” she hums, “I’ve been thinking about it for weeks. I just couldn’t say anything till now.”

“If you choose to remember this on the morn, and you wish to… explore our options… you both know where to find me.” He draws away, looking at her with an expression she isn’t quite able to interpret. “Thank you, Keyleth,” he breathes, and then with a swish of his cloak strides purposefully off into the night.

What was his expression, just then? Relief? Guilt? Wonderment? Sorrow? Will she ever be able to tell? She wants to. It suddenly strikes her, like a lightning bolt, that she would really like to know that man better. Well enough that it isn’t just luck that allows her to read the lines at the corners of his eyes.

Vax, Kiki… and Gilmore.

It doesn’t sound that strange. Keyleth smiles, a secret smile all for herself. Not so strange. How unexpected.

**Author's Note:**

> No, it doesn't appear I can write a fic about Keyleth that doesn't have her wringing her hands in it somewhere. She's developed a headcanon tic and it's here to stay. Also, my headcanon kind of took a life of its own, and now Keyleth understands sex from the basic natural/technical level--but mutual attraction and romantic affection are overwhelming and slightly alien for her. She's just never experienced them before, and isn't confident enough in herself to recognize them when she feels them. Poor Kiki.


End file.
